IIRIS headlining Urban Bar opening party

IIRIS (Made In Baltics) is an Estonian electronic-pop artist based in London. I became acquainted to her music when I watched in March 2018 Eesti Laul since she performed there her single Drop That Boogie featuring producer Agoh. Honestly, she was one of my favorites in the competition and I was sad that she didn’t win the Estonian preselection for the Eurovision Song Contest because she was in my opinion the best Estonian performing artist. Plus – I liked the pinkred light (informally known as the bisexual light!) that was projected during her performance.

IIRIS is by far one of the best vocalists in the Estonian music industry. On the 25th October I was lucky to have the chance to listen to her 1-hour set at the Opening party in the Urban Bar which is located near Old Town.

There were multiple times during her concert where I felt incredibly touched by her voice and music. Especially when she sang the lines “Cuz baby you’re a star / you know that you are / you are / you are” from her latest single Star (which was by the way relaesed one day after the concert), I had tears in my eyes. IIRIS is singing from her heart and she’s singing like there’s no end.

What I liked about her performance was her dancing and the fact that she was actively connecting to us listeners. Also, her playing e-guitar was indeed empowering. She looked us in the eyes, she sometimes left the stage to join us partying and she was sometimes also mimicking us which was real fun!

IIRIS was also playing on her beautiful flute. Her music style in general has changed to a more lighter and happier sound. When announcing her new single Star on Facebook, IIRIS stated that she is so proud of her new single Star because it’s the happiest song she has ever written so far.

And now comes the best thing: After the concert IIRIS was coming to us and thanking us for listening to her! She was so relieved and touched and we all hugged her and I told her how much I loved her performance. Since we were all in such a good mood, IIRIS invited us to drink some champaign in her hotelroom. See oli nii suurepärane! We were chatting about our recent revelations, about Troye Sivan and how difficult it is to make it in the music business. IIRIS’s recent revelation was the following: You get what you can tolerate. When talking about the music business, IIRIS was telling us that she attended the Tallinn Music Week once to listen to all the talks and panels by music experts and what most where telling her that you get successful with your art when you make good music. We laughed knowing that making good music is freaking hard.

Besides I have told her about my own struggles and doubts to make music. Because I always want to make tunes, but I am constantly thinking about how to make it professionally as an artist and whether I really want to make it in the music business. But during the conversation with her I realized that I should not be doubtful and just be creative and have fun with the music-making.

This evening was a very special one. It belongs to these events that I will never forget. I was feeling during the next days still over the moon and also gloomy because I wished that I could reexperience the concert again.